I am going mad trying to figure out this stitch. I am using book #5 from The Stitch Collection, the Specialty stitches.

Rows 1 and 3 are purled, and it is the other two rows that are giving me trouble.

*K2tog, without slipping the stitches from the left needle. Insert the right needle between the two stitches and knit into the first stitch again, slipping both stitches off the left needle.*

I have done this, however as I progress with the rows, it looks nothing like the textured fabric shown in the picture. I end up with a nice smooth fabric. It's actually pretty, but I want the textured fabric pictured.

I have tried purling the first stitch, knitting through the back loop... I cannot get this! I tried to find errata, but just get an error from the link I found. I searched through my other stitch pattern books because this seems familiar to me, but I can't find it to compare instructions. Can anyone help?

*K2tog, without slipping the stitches from the left needle. Insert the right needle between the two stitches and knit into the first stitch again, slipping both stitches off the left needle.*

I'm not familiar with this exact stitch, but that you described above is also called a faux cable or mini cable and comes up frequently. It should *look* like a mini cable when you do it (unless something weird happens to it the following RS row,) are you seeing that effect with those stitches?

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. - Marianne Williamson

Can you show us a picture of what the stitch is supposed to look like? I've done one called "Little Flowers", but the one I did was an eyelet pattern that looked like this:
. .
. .
\ / the flower being made of 4 eyelets and the leaves 5 in a vee.

Not the same at all as what you are looking at. They aren't always standard with names.

I tired doing the stitch as you gave it and got the same results you did.

Then I looked through my stitch books (Your sample's purple yarn is not the easiest to see what is happening on though.) I found a couple of things that looked similar, but when my husband came home for lunch I showed him what I was up to and he looked at the purple swatch and said, "It looks like a bunch of knots." I told him I had seen a stitch in the book called a Knot Stitch and maybe I should take a closer look at it.

So I did and saw that it was formed quiet a bit like yours but mostly knit instead of mostly purl. Here is what it said:

This must be worked on a multiple of 2+1 to work.

Row 1 (RS): Knit
Row 2: K1, *p2tog without slipping sts off needle, then k tog the same 2 sts; rep from * to end. (my comment: remember to put the yarn in back before you knit the 2tog)
Row 3: Knit
Row 4: *P2tog without slipping sts off needle, then k tog the same 2 sts; rep from * to last st, k1.
Repeat the 4 rows for the pattern.

I knitted that up and it looks quite a bit like your purple picture. And that gave me the idea that maybe your pattern needs to be worked over an odd number of stitches and offset like that. So I tried:

Multiple of 2+1

Row 1: Purl
Row 2: K1, *k2tog but don't take off the needle then knit the first st again; rep from *.
Row 3: Purl
Row 4: *K2tog but don't take off the needle then k the first st again; rep to last st, k1.

I just had another idea and tried it out:

Multiple of 2+1
Row 1: Purl
Row 2: K1, *k2tog then bring the yarn to the front and purl the same 2tog again; rep from *.
Row 3: *K2tog then bring the yarn to the front and purl the same 2tog again; rep from * to last st, k1.
Row 4: Purl

That looks pretty good. You still have a side that looks quite a bit like your pink result, but I believe for this stitch that that will be the wrong side not the side you want. Even your original pink sample, turn it over and it is closer to what you are looking for than the side that looks sort of like ribbing.

Try my 3 alternatives and see if any of them look like something you could use.

__________________

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to MerigoldinWA For This Useful Post:

Sometimes you have to knit six rows or more before you begin to see the pattern. This is the case when you're doing the Brioche stitch and cables. It doesn't look like much in the beginning, but after a while it turns out beautifully.

This is probably a dumb question. But what does the other side look like. I once did the bee stitch. When looking at the side I thought was the right side it actually was the wrong side. All because in the the direction it doesn't specify that the first row was a wrong side row.